"Critics argue that giving amnesty to 12 to 30 million illegal aliens in the U.S. would have an immediate negative impact on America’s working and middle class — specifically black Americans and the white working class — who would be in direct competition for blue-collar jobs with the largely low-skilled illegal alien population." JOHN BINDER

"He (Trump) is able to get a
hearing because millions of people are being driven into
economic insecurity and poverty while the rich and
the super-rich continue to amass obscene levels
of wealth. He is able with some success to divert mass discontent
along reactionary nationalist and racialist channels precisely
because what passes for the “left” in American politics,
anchor by the Democratic Party, has moved ever further
to the right, culminating in the Obama administration which
has presided over endless war and an unprecedented redistribution of
wealth from the bottom to the top of the economic ladder."

Mexican drug cartels
are the “other” terrorist threat to America. Militant Islamists have the goal
of destroying the United States.Mexican drug cartels
are now accomplishing that mission – from within, every day, in virtually every
community across this country.

The DEA’s 2015 threat assessment says Mexican drug cartels “remain
the greatest criminal drug threat to the United States; no other group can
challenge them in the near term.” Mexican
drug cartels are engaged in an insidious and deadly attack on our country –
right now.

The Commonwealth of Virginia declared a public health emergency
on November 21, 2016, over the growing crisis of heroin and opioid addiction.

There has been an exponential increase and simultaneous shift,
from prescription opioids to heroin (sometimes mixed with the synthetic
narcotic fentanyl). For the Mexican drug cartels, the border is in Virginia,
Ohio, New Hampshire, and all other communities across the country.

The American heroin market begins in the poppy fields of Mexico.
Controlled by the cartels, and more recently assisted by Southwest Asians who
provide agricultural production techniques (increasing both quantity and
quality) – and combat training for the cartel armies (learned by fighting US
forces).

The cartel armies are increasingly dangerous and more
sophisticated. In May 2015, the Wall Street Journal reported foreign
fighters training the Jalisco New Generation Cartel in how to shoot down
Mexican Army helicopters. It’s “win-win” for the Mexican cartels and the
jihadis.

Barranca del Cobre
(Copper Canyon) and the rural southwest corner of Chihuahua are the Sinaloa
Cartel’s base for poppy production. Reportedly, the same area has the largest
concentration of Islamists in Mexico – surpassed, perhaps, only by Mexico City.

None of this information is “news” to U.S. law enforcement,
intelligence, defense or diplomatic officials. The staff of the El Paso
Intelligence Center (EPIC) literally watches it all go on – right under their
noses.

How can this be? Here is the unpopular answer: We have an
“insider threat” – corrupt law enforcement officers at the municipal, state and
federal levels – who are bought and paid for by the Mexican cartels.

The corruption runs the gamut from turning a blind eye to
accepting monthly stipends and performance bonuses deposited in banks in, for
example, Ciudad Juárez. The corrupt law
enforcement officers are aided and abetted by corrupt elected officials and
crooked lawyers who know how to work the system. These are often
popular local and regional public figures with business interests and standing
in the community. They are also people who leverage their positions in order to
“never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity” when it comes to
enforcement.

The corrupting process
is facilitated in the United States by “legitimate” cartel fronts, in the
agribusiness and transportation industries, among others. No one likes
that answer, but it’s the truth.

How else can tractor-trailer loads of heroin make it into the
country? How has such an elaborate and efficient distribution system spread
throughout the country and perpetuated itself for decades? One knowledgeable
law enforcement source gave me an example:

“Does Walmart ever run out of milk? No. That’s exactly what the
cartel distribution system is like across the entire country. It only works so
efficiently because of corruption.”

The greatest criminal
threat to the daily lives of American citizens are the Mexican drug cartels. Their corrosive power
is killing Americans regardless of race, color, creed or zip code – and that
undermines public confidence in the rule of law. The cartels corrupt our
trusted public officials and institutions. Their violence and cruelty
know no bounds.

What will President Trump and Attorney General Sessions do
differently to defeat this “other” threat to the United States?

They need to start by “cleaning house” at the Justice Department
and the Department of Homeland Security.

When
someone self-righteously defends wide open borders, show him this article. I
encourage you, as well. Watch Chrishereas he
discusses this most serious of issues.

THE OBAMA SOLUTION TO END
WHITE CHRISTIAN AMERICA:

DRUG ADDICTION!!!

MEXICO: AMERICA’S DRUG
DEALER!

The same period has seen
a massive growth of social inequality, with income and wealth concentrated at
the very top of American society to an extent not seen since the 1920s.

The new orders by the Obama Administration to release Haitians caught at the border will only exacerbate the current situation since Mexican cartels are now coaching illegal aliens on how to game the U.S. immigration system, Border Patrol agents said.

“They are being told that all they have to do is request asylum and claim to be in fear and they will be released,” said Garza who is a U.S. Border Patrol agent but is able to talk to the media in his capacity as local union president.

In the case of Haitians, Breitbart Texas has reported on how they arrive to Mexico claiming to be African to receive a 20-day permit to pass through the country northward. With that permit, they have been arriving at U.S. international bridges requesting asylum.

The move continues to overwhelm U.S. authorities as the number of asylum seekers continues to rise, adding more work to the already overwhelmed agents who, according to NBPC officials, lack manpower, equipment, and help from Washington.

“On one hand you have the asylum seekers, but then on the other you have the people (other illegal immigrants) who come across the river and try to get around us,” Garza said. “If we do apprehend them, the first thing they do is claim asylum because they have been told that they will be released.”

Since federal authorities have run out of space in detention facilities, they have been releasing asylum seekers and illegal immigrants with a court notice telling them to appear at a later date.

“This is an orchestrated strategy by the cartels and the human smuggling organizations where they are coaching these individuals,” he said. “The recent moves by the administration will only serve as bait to draw more individuals to risk their lives at the hands of these ruthless criminal organizations.”

Ildefonso Ortiz is an award winning journalist with Breitbart Texas. He co-founded the Cartel Chronicles project and you can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook.

By Kate Randall 19 November 2016

One in seven Americans will become addicted to drugs or alcohol in their lifetimes, but only 10 percent of those affectedwill ever receive any help in treating their addictions. These are some of the grim statistics provided in a new report released Thursday by the US surgeon general and the Department of Health and Human Services.

“Facing Addiction in America: The Surgeon General’s Report on Alcohol, Drugs, and Health” reports that over 27 million people in the United States reported current use of illicit drugs or misuse of prescription drugs in 2015, and over 66 million people reported binge drinking in the past month.

The victims of this health and societal crisis are the tens of thousands of lives lost and ruined each year due to substance misuse. Substance addiction cuts across all segments of society, but has hit rural communities, the deindustrialized Rust Belt and impoverished areas of Appalachia particularly hard.

Alcohol misuse contributes to 88,000 deaths in the US every year; 1 in 10 deaths among working adults is due to alcohol misuse. In 2014, there were 47,055 drug overdose deaths, including 28,647 people who died from a drug overdose involving some type of opioid, more than in any previous year on record.

The report uses the term “misuse” as opposed to “abuse” in an effort to remove some of the stigma of addiction to encourage and facilitate treatment.

While the US spends more than any other country on health care, it ranks 27th in life expectancy, at a time when life expectancy continues to increase in other developed countries. The report notes that this disparity in life expectancy “is largely due to substance misuse and associated physical and mental health problems.”

The report points to recent research showing an unprecedented increase in mortality among middle-aged white Americans between 1999 and 2014 that was largely driven by alcohol and drug misuse and suicides, although this trend was not witnessed in other racial and ethnic populations.

In 2014, 9,967 people were killed in motor vehicle accidents in the US while driving under the influence of alcohol, accounting for nearly one third of all traffic-related fatalities. While there are approximately 1.3 million arrests for driving under the influence each year, this number represents only about 1 percent of the actual alcohol-impaired driving incidents reported in national surveys.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports more than 2,200 alcohol overdose (alcohol poisoning) deaths in the US each year, an average of six a day. More than three quarters of alcohol overdose deaths occur among adults between the ages of 35 and 64, and 76 percent who die are men.

In 2014, 47,055 drug overdose deaths occurred in the US, with 61 percent of these the result of opioid use, including prescription opioids and heroin. The number of people dying from opioid overdoses increased nearly fourfold between 1999 and 2014.

The report notes that the over-prescription of opioid pain relievers beginning in the 1990s has led to a rapid escalation of their use and misuse among a wide demographic of men and women across the US. The use of opioids is so widespread that more people use prescription opioids (38 percent) than all tobacco products combined (31 percent).

Nearly 30,000 people died due to a heroin or prescription opioid overdose in 2014, and an estimated 20,000 died as a result of an unintentional overdose of alcohol, cocaine, or non-opioid prescription drugs.

The illegal manufacturing and distribution of synthetic opioids such as fentanyl, which are often combined with heroin or distributed as heroin, are contributing to the rapid increase in opioid overdose deaths.

Alcohol and drug misuse have numerous longer-term effects on physical and mental health. Heavy drinking can lead to hypertension, liver disease and certain cancers; regular marijuana use is associated with chronic bronchitis; and use of stimulants such as cocaine can lead to heart disease.

Alcohol and substance misuse during pregnancy can result in long lasting health effects for the baby. Alcohol misuse can cause fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASDs), resulting in physical, mental and behavioral problems in children. It is estimated that FASDs affect as many as 2 to 5 percent of the population. The opioid crisis has resulted in a fivefold increase in the number of babies dependent on opioids at birth.

The National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) found that among the more than 265 million Americans aged 12 and over in 2015, almost 8 percent of this population met diagnostic criteria for a substance use disorder for alcohol or illicit drugs. Another 1 percent met the criteria for both an alcohol and illicit drug use disorder.

Although 20.8 million people met the diagnostic criteria for a substance use disorder in 2015, only 2.2 million of them received any type of treatment. The surgeon general’s report is short on answers as to why this is the case.

The report includes a chapter on “The Neurobiology of Substance Use, Misuse, and Addiction,” which describes the three main circuits in the brain involved in addiction, and explains how substance use can “hijack” the normal functioning of these circuits.

“Understanding this transformation in the brain is critical to understanding why addiction is a health condition, not a moral failing or character flaw,” the authors note. They also point to medications that have proven useful in treating both drug and alcohol addiction, but which have been often overlooked and under-prescribed.

The surgeon general’s report recommends health professionals act on this research in their treatment of those suffering from addiction. However, the fact that 90 percent of those in need of treatment never receive it—and addiction and overdose deaths continue to skyrocket—points to deeper economic and social factors. This includes the lack of funding for alcohol and drug misuse treatment at federal, state and local level, leading to those in need often ending up in the prison system instead of in treatment.

Recognizing the role of poverty, unemployment and other life stresses as contributing factors to addiction, the surgeon general’s report recommends initiatives to provide affordable housing, job training and recovery support to “address the risk and protective factors that are most actionable at the local level.”

Arguing that “the health care system alone cannot address all of the major determinants of health related to substance misuse,” the authors recommend rallying “community-based organizations, religious institutions, law enforcement, local businesses, researchers and other public, private, and voluntary entities” to tackle the crisis.

Under conditions where austerity and budget cuts can only be expected to deepen under the future Trump administration, such band-aid prescriptions offer little hope to the tens of millions suffering from addiction, many of whom face a future of increased health problems, overdose and death.

THE REALITY OF A NATION ENDLESSLY LOOTED BY

WALL STREET'S BILLIONAIRE CLASS

"The brutality of this society, compounded by

militarism and police violence, falls hardest

on the young. One study has found that the

prevalence of serious depression among

teenagers increased by 37 percent between

2005 and 2014. Another reported that

children from 10 through 14 are for the first

time more likely to die from suicide than from

a car accident."

HEROIN!

MEXICO'S BIGGEST DOLLAR EXPORT TO AMERICA

"The number of heroin overdoses in Virginia in the first 9 months of this year has increased 89 percent compared to the previous year."

Virginia declares opioid addiction a public health emergency

By Brad Dixon 29 November 2016

Virginia’s health commissioner declared last week that opioid addiction in the state is a public health emergency. She issued a standing order allowing any resident of the state to access naloxone, which can reverse the effects of an opioid overdose.

According to Virginia Health Commissioner Marissa J. Levine, three people die every day in the state from opioid overdoses, while 12 people are treated in the emergency room. The number of heroin overdoses in Virginia in the first 9 months of this year has increased 89 percent compared to the previous year.

In 2014, for the first time more Virginians died from opioid overdoses (728) than from car accidents (700).

According to the Virginia Hospital and Healthcare Association, between 2007 and 2015 there were 4,036 deaths in the state related to prescription opioid overdoses. Between 2011 and 2014, more than 1,300 babies in Virginia were born with neonatal abstinence syndrome due to the mother’s drug use.

The declaration follows the release of a surgeon general’s report that found one in seven Americans face substance addiction, but only 10 percent ever receive any assistance. According to the report, last year over 27 million people in the United States used illicit drugs or misused prescription drugs.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 61 percent of the 47,055 drug overdoses in 2014 were due to opioid use. That translates to an average of 78 opioid overdose deaths in the United States every day. This number has nearly quadrupled since 1999.

The number of overdoses and resulting deaths has worsened due to the use of stronger opioids, such as fentanyl and carfentanil.

Fentanyl, a synthetic opioid, is estimated to be 50 to 100 times as potent as morphine, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse. The fast-acting nature of fentanyl increases the likelihood and lethality of overdoses compared to heroin or other prescription drugs.

Carfentanil, an analog of fentanyl, is a tranquilizer used for elephants and other large animals. It is 10,000 times as potent as morphine. The drug has never been tested on humans in clinical trials, so there is little is known about the drug, including the lethal dose range. Drug users often mistake carfentanil for heroin or heroin mixed with fentanyl because of their similarity in appearance, heightening the danger of the drug.

Carfentanil-related incidents have been concentrated in the states of Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Kentucky and West Virginia, but also further south in Georgia and Florida. Incidents have also emerged in Virginia, according to the state’s health commissioner.

The potency of these stronger opioids means that overdose victims typically require multiple doses of naloxone to be revived. They have been at the root of the recent spate of overdoses in cities such as Huntington, West Virginia in August and Akron, Ohio in September.

A driving factor in the rise in opioid addiction and deaths from overdoses in the past 15 years is the increase in the number of prescriptions for opioid painkillers, such as oxycodone, hydrocodone and fentanyl—marketed as OxyContin, Percocet, Vicodin, Subsys, etc. Aggressive marketing by drugmakers has magnified the opioid epidemic, while at the same time enriching pharmaceutical companies.

Purdue Pharma, for example, encouraged doctors to prescribe OxyContin for all types of aches and pains, not just those associated with terminal illnesses. In order to distinguish the drug from cheaper, generic opioid painkillers, the company marketed the drug as providing 12-hour relief. When patients complained that the medication lost its effectiveness prematurely, Purdue encouraged doctors to prescribe higher doses for the same time interval—increasing the risk of addiction and overdose.

The drug became a blockbuster and placed the owners of Purdue, the Sackler family, onto Forbes’ list of the 20 wealthiest families with a personal wealth of $14 billion. The company, now based in Stamford, Connecticut, has opposed any attempts to place restrictions on prescribing OxyContin, while showering politicians with campaign cash.

Insys Pharmaceuticals, based in Chandler, Arizona, is the manufacturer of a rapid-acting version of fentanyl marketed as Subsys. The company is currently under investigation in more than 15 regions by state attorneys general, federal prosecutors and regulators over its business practices and marketing of Subsys.

In a 22-count criminal indictment filed in Mobile, Alabama against two doctors prescribing vast quantities of opioid painkillers, federal prosecutors allege that Insys effectively bribed doctors by rewarding them for writing large numbers of prescriptions for Subsys, prescribing a combined $4.9 million worth of the drug, according to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal. An analysis of federal data by the Journal found that the top 20 prescribers of Subsys for Medicare patients in 2014 were also the largest recipients of consulting and other fees from Insys. Dr. Gavin Awerbuch, for example, a Michigan neurologist who recently pled guilty to prescribing Subsys for no legitimate medical purpose, wrote $10.1 million worth of Subsys prescriptions for Medicare patients between 2013 and 2014, and received $90,000 in fees from Insys from August 2013 through 2015.

Insys is run by billionaire John N. Kapoor. Prior to co-founding Insys in 2002, Kapoor gained control of LyphoMedi in 1987 through a $50,000 investment. He quadrupled the price of the company’s decades-old drug that was being used to treat AIDS, before selling the company in 1990, a sale that made him more than $100 million.

Subsys, approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 2012, was the company’s first new product. The drug now captures half of the prescriptions for rapid-acting fentanyl. Since 2013, the company’s revenue has tripled, while its profits grew by 45 percent to $58.5 million.

“The drug’s success,” notes the Journal, “was underpinned by tactics that Dr. Kapoor used to great effect at his previous companies, charging high prices and employing a low-salaried, highly motivated sales force.”

Since the launch of Subsys four years ago, Insys has more than doubled the price of the drug.

The company’s 250 sales representatives focus on doctors who are the highest prescribers of fast-acting fentanyl. Sales reps are paid a low base salary, but have financial incentives to push doctors to prescribe the largest number of prescriptions, at the highest doses possible, through sales commissions.

According to the Journal, staff from the company’s reimbursement center would often call up and lie to pharmacy benefits managers—for example, pretending to be from the office of the doctor that wrote the prescription, or lying that the patient had cancer—to ensure that Subsys would be covered by insurance, which generally limits coverage to cancer patients or requires patients to seek out a lower-cost alternative first.

And while some drugmakers have profited handsomely while contributing to the opioid epidemic, others pharmaceutical companies are intent on profiting from the crisis by jacking up the price of the drug used to treat opioid overdoses, naloxone.

Naloxone binds to the opioid receptors in the central nervous system, and is considered to be an “antidote” to opioid overdose. Discovered in the early 1960s and approved by the FDA in 1971, naloxone has few side effects and is included in most emergency responder kits. It is administered either through intravenous injection or a nasal spray.

“For people who regularly take opioids, including those who take the drugs as prescribed by the doctor for pain, having naloxone on hand can mean the difference between life and death,” Phillip Coffin, M.D., the director of the Substance Use Research Unit at the San Francisco Department of Public Health, told Consumer Reports in September.

This past May, Politico broke the story on the dramatic price hikes on naloxone formulations. Drugmakers are increasing the price of a drug that has long been available at a low price, similar to the widely publicized price hikes of EpiPen by Mylan and Daraprim by Turning Pharmaceuticals. There are currently five different formulations on the market. The most common formulation of nalaxone is made by Amphastar Pharmaceuticals, which in October 2014 raised the list price of its 10 pre-filled, 2-milliliter syringes from $120 to $330.

Likewise, Kaleo Pharma raised the list price for its two single-dose Evzio injectors from $575 two years ago to $3,750. Between 2005 and 2014, Hospira, now owned by Pfizer, jacked the price for two vials of its generic version from $1.84 to $31.66.

Mylan released an additional generic version in 2014, while Adapt Pharma’s Narcan nasal spray was approved in 2015. The competition between multiple formulations, however, has done nothing to bring down the price.

Kaleo, for example, has used its price increases to help cover patient copays, which encourages patients to purchase more expensive branded drugs and ultimately drives up insurance rates. The only change made to the company’s latest auto injector is the packaging, which now includes voice-activated instructions.

The price hikes, moreover, have nothing to do with actual cost of manufacturing the drug.

“We’re not talking about a limited commodity,” Dan Bigg, the executive director of the Chicago Recovery Alliance, told Business Insider in August. “Naloxone is a medicine that is almost as cheap as sterile sodium chloride—salt water.”

“This is an older generic drug on the World Health Organization’s list of essential medicines. It costs pennies in other countries,” Baltimore Health Commissioner Leana Wen, told Consumer Reports. “It’s completely inappropriate and, frankly, shameful that we are faced with these rising prices in the midst of an opioid epidemic. No one should be dying because we can’t afford this drug.”

The price hikes are “not conscionable,” Wen told Politico. “We have not been able to understand what is motivating them except for profit.”

“One concern is that money for naloxone is coming out of the same pot as money for treatment and prevention,” Alison Knopf, editor of Alcoholism & Drug Abuse Weekly, told Stat News this past summer. “The costlier it is, the less money for treatment and prevention.”

While price hikes for pharmaceuticals are often cushioned through insurance coverage, the story is different with naloxone.

“In the case of naloxone,” Daniel Raymond, policy director of the Harm Reduction Coalition, told CNBC in September, “when it’s purchased directly by health departments, or community organizations or police departments, there’s no buffer, they pay the whole cost, so any increase in price erodes their purchasing power, and they’re either able to purchase fewer or they’re gonna need to find additional dollars to keep pace with the demand.”

The source of the drive by pharmaceutical companies to aggressively market prescription painkillers while at the same time hiking the price of the antidote to opioid overdoses, is the same one that lies at the root of the immense social crisis that is ultimately responsible for the epidemic of opioid addiction and overdoses, and the completely inadequate response to address these social problems: the profit system.

The complex interaction between personal and social problems, between brain chemistry and social conditions, the sense of desperation and hopelessness, the lack of social support and connection, all of the factors that come together to produce substance abuse, addiction and drug overdoses, in the final analysis, have their basis within a social system in which every decision is based upon the profit needs of corporations and where the vast majority of the population faces stagnant or declining wages, crushing debt and unrelenting economic uncertainty and austerity.

"These figures present a scathing indictment of the social order that prevails in America, the world’s wealthiest country, whose government proclaims itself to be the globe’s leading democracy. They are just one manifestation of the human toll taken by the vast and all-pervasive inequality and mass poverty

OBAMA-CLINTONOMICS TO SERVE THE SUPER RICH:

The slow and painful death of America that dominates American society."

“This study follows reports released over the past several months documenting rising mortality rates among US workers due to drug addiction and suicide, high rates of infant mortality, an overall leveling off of life expectancy, and a growing gap between the life expectancy of the bottom rung of income earners compared to those at the top.”

24 November 2016

On October 3, 1863, in the midst of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln signed a proclamation authored by Secretary of State William H. Seward declaring the last Thursday of November “a day of thanksgiving.”

Despite a Civil War of “unequalled magnitude and severity,” the declaration stated, the conflict had not “arrested the plough, the shuttle or the ship,” while “the mines, as well of iron and coal as of the precious metals, have yielded even more abundantly than heretofore.” The proclamation concluded, “The country, rejoicing in the consciousness of augmented strength and vigor, is permitted to expect continuance of years with large increase of freedom.”

The ravages of the Civil War would last another year and a half. Nevertheless, it was true that society was being transformed by railroads, steamboats and the telegraph, an expansion in productive capacity that would accelerate with the rapid industrialization fostered by the Second American Revolution. The Civil War would clear the way for capitalist progress—and the explosive growth of the class struggle—by abolishing slavery.

As families throughout the United States gather to share a meal this Thanksgiving, relatively few will agree with Seward’s assessment that the country can expect “years with large increase of freedom.” Rather, for many, Thanksgiving will serve only to underline the economic hardship and oppression they face.

More than one in eight households will have had difficulty putting food on the table the year before, and millions will have a Thanksgiving meal only by standing in line at a food pantry or soup kitchen.

Over a million-and-a-half people were homeless last year, including some 300,000 children and 450,000 disabled people. Millions more live in substandard housing, doubled up with other families, or in motels. Such conditions may affect only a minority of American families directly. But the great majority of the population is economically insecure.

Forty-six percent of adults are so financially strapped that “they either could not cover an emergency expense costing $400, or would cover it by selling something or borrowing money,” according to a survey released by the Federal Reserve this year.

Under these circumstances, the announcement that the average premium under the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), supposedly designed to insure lower-income people, will increase 25 percent next year means that millions will either lose their health coverage or face hundreds, or even thousands of dollars in additional expenses.

The terrific stress caused by living in households one accident or illness away from financial ruin, in which young people are burdened by debt and face narrowing prospects, while the elderly confront rising medical costs and decreasing retirement benefits, produces many signs of social distress.

The brutality of this society, compounded by militarism and police violence, falls hardest on the young. One study has found that the prevalence of serious depression among teenagers increased by 37 percent between 2005 and 2014. Another reported that children from 10 through 14 are for the first time more likely to die from suicide than froma car accident.

Perhaps the most devastating manifestation of the social malaise is America’s drug epidemic. This year, a shocking 28,000 people will die from opioid overdose, almost as many as the number killed in car accidents. For tens of thousands of families, Thanksgiving will be a time of mourning for those who have lost their lives to heroin, fentanyl or prescription painkillers.

Many of the states most affected by the drug epidemic are those worst hit by joblessness and deindustrialization. Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania, the “rust belt” states that backed Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012 but swung behind Donald Trump in the 2016 election, all saw their rates of opiate overdose increase by more than 10 percent between 2013 and 2014.

The social crisis in the United States is fueling an immense growth of oppositional sentiment, including significant signs of renewed class struggle and political radicalization that found only initial expression in the elections. This came first in the widespread support during the Democratic primaries for Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, who called himself a socialist and denounced the “billionaire class” and social inequality.

Sanders’ “political revolution” concluded ignominiously with an endorsement of Hillary Clinton, who ran on the claim that, in the words of President Obama, America is doing “pretty darn great.” The implication of this delusional narrative was that those who disagreed and were swayed by Republican candidate Donald Trump’s demagogic appeals to social discontent were part of the “white racist working class,” seeking to defend their “privileged” status against blacks and other minorities. Basing her campaign on various forms of identity politics, Clinton pitched her appeal to the affluent and complacent. The result was a sharp decline in votes for the Democratic candidate within all sections of the working class.

Trump, who is being installed in the White House with the blessings of the outgoing president and both parties, will not “make America great again.” Neither he nor any section of the ruling class has a solution to the social crisis gripping America. His “America first” economic nationalism will exacerbate the global capitalist crisis and mean sharper attacks on workers within the United States. His program of tax cuts for the wealthy, the elimination of regulations on corporations, cuts in social programs and an immense increase in military spending will fuel social discontent and anger.

Trump’s election marks a turning point in the looming showdown between the financial parasites he personifies and the great mass of the population, the working class.

"These figures present a scathing indictment
of the social order that prevails in America, the world’s wealthiest country,
whose government proclaims itself to be the globe’s leading democracy. They are
just one manifestation of the human toll taken by the vast and all-pervasive
inequality and mass poverty

OBAMA-CLINTONOMICS TO SERVE THE SUPER RICH:

The
slow and painful death of America that dominates American society."

America’s Looming Economic Armageddon
– Can the Rich Get Even Richer During the Meltdown? Haven’t they looted us into
bankruptcy?

On
behalf of bankster-owned Barack Obama, Yellen vows to the rich and crony
banksters that they will be protected and subsidized with no strings bailouts
during the next looming economic meltdown around the corner from elections.

“In fact, these policies have
already produced financial and asset bubbles that are unsustainable, and there
are increasing signs of financial instability and crisis. There are growing
warnings that the spread of negative interest rates is leading to a new
financial meltdown even worse than the disaster that struck eight years ago.”